Each week, guest speakers from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines join the Reverend Peter Thompson and other St. Bart's clergy for deep and insightful conversations about topics that matter to our lives as responsible citizens and people of faith. Speakers in recent years have included winners of the Tony Award, the Emmy Award, the MacArthur Fellowship, and the Pulitzer Prize, professors from prominent universities like Yale, Harvard, Princeton, and Columbia, and journalists from New York, The New Yorker, and The Atlantic.
In accordance with the Church’s Bylaws, the Vestry has set the time and place for the annual parish meeting and election of Vestry officers. These will take place, on Sunday, February 8, 2026, at 10 am in the nave of the church and online. Click for more information. The Forum will return on Sunday. February 15.
February 15: Melanie Holcomb, Ph.D., Curator, Metropolitan Museum of Art, and Nancy Thebaut, Ph.D., Associate Professor of the History of Art, University of Oxford
February 22: Michael Zuch, LCSW, Clinical Social Worker and Ph.D. student at Rutgers University School of Social Work
Watch or listen to The Forum from previous weeks below.
Artist Mel Ahlborn, Director of Illumination Studio, introduces the baptismal font she created for St. Bart’s and reflects on the meaning of baptism and the way in which art continues to enhance the life of the Church.
Claudio Lomnitz, Professor of Anthropology at Columbia University and author of Death and The Idea of Mexico, provides an overview of the beloved Mexican tradition.
The Reverend Dr. Randall Balmer, John Phillips Professor in Religion at Dartmouth College, discusses his new book about the intimate–and often unexamined–connections between religion and sports.
The Reverend Dr. Robert Willis, the recently retired Dean of Canterbury Cathedral in England, looks back at over two decades of distinguished service. During his time in Canterbury, Dean Willis not only hosted an important Lambeth Conference...
Akash Mehta, Editor-in-Chief of journalism start-up New York Focus, reflects on the fight for criminal justice reform, the implementation of a new climate law, and other issues facing our city and our state.
How did Jesus and the earliest Christians approach issues of economic justice? Miguel Escobar, Executive Director of Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary, provides an overview based on his new book.
At this key moment in the life of The Episcopal Church, St. Bart’s parishioner Mary Kate Wold, CEO & President of the Church Pension Group, shares basic facts about our denomination and the clergy who serve it.
The clergy of St. James’s Piccadilly, London reflect on their experiences of ministering to an urban metropolis.
Dr. James Cone, the Medical Director of the World Trade Center Health Registry, shares insights from his work investigating the connections between 9/11 and physical and mental health.
Yomaira Franqui of Local 338 discusses the efforts she is leading to organize and advocate for the rights of farmworkers in New York and New Jersey.
